technology or people? (was: The ships of LoGH)

Wayne H. Yin (why@mail.utexas.edu)
Wed, 6 Nov 1996 05:25:36 -0600 

hey mike,

    yeah, i totally agree with you about how tanaka was probably thinking
of more important things than making up bad-physics to explain how this or
that works.  besides, as arthur c. clark would put it, the technology in
LoGH is so advanced so as to appear as magic to us.  that's good enough for
me.

    and besides, something disturbing that i've noticed in the business
world (such as at IBM, where i worked) is that very often the technology is
thought of by management as more important than people.  but anyone with an
ounce of sense knows that you can't completely substitute technology for
people.  every company that tought they could completely replace factory
workers with robots learned some very hard lessons: technology *augments*
people, not replace them.  it's even more true in science fiction; cool
technology and special effects can't make up for no story and empty
characters.  i hope people remember that as we become more and more
technology-oriented and enamoured with hi-tech marvels.

> And there does tend to be a rather inconsistency in technology doesn't
> there.
>
    i've noticed the inconsistency in technology sometimes too.  not so
much the "here today, gone tomorrow" of some technology/capability in the
show, but more of some of the implications of the technology.  for example,
"if they had that other technology, how come they can't do *THIS*?!!"

    a key example is gravity.  if they have artificial gravity on their
ships, then that's a fundamental breakthrough of science that has all sorts
of implications everywhere else, especially in terms of weapons and
tactics.  if you can generate artificial gravity... you've *unified* force
and gravitation, probably even with the nuclear forces as well, and you can
do it on demand!  can you imagine being able to alter the apparent
gravitational attraction of matter, even on a fairly small scale?  (or at
least of objects?)

    if you could scale it up (and i'm willing to accept that power
constraints don't allow them to), you could develop force field/shields
(which they did have in the first movie) or gravity bombs.

    and the curious thing about it is that it's directed gravity... it only
seems to pull people down towards the deck, not up towards the overhead
deck.  i wonder if the top of the brunhild gets dusty from dirt and garbage
attracted by the internal gravity? ;-)  don't tell me gravity magically
stops at the ceiling!

    and warp drive is something else.  even assuming that they can only
warp relatively short distances (they can't cross the space between
galactic arms), why can't they warp ships into an enemy's flank?  or, even
better, warp robot minelayers right into the midst of an enemy formation
and scatter a bunch of homing mines or CAPTOR mines before it can be
destroyed.  you've already seen in the series how ships in a tight
formation don't just blow up... they get knocked off course or blow into
big pieces and take other ships with them.  especially when they're
confused or caught by surprise, they're like bowling pins.

> And there does tend to be a rather inconsistency in technology doesn't
> there. [...]  The axes are for sheer dramatic affect me thinks.  After
> all...  zefron particles doesn't explode if you fire say, an air
> compression rifle.
>
    yeah, zephyr particles probably won't detonate from an air rifle.  just
like how they use crossbows instead of lasers.  but like "minovski"
particles in gundam and the particle-of-the-episode in star trek (the next
generation), i think it's some convenient piece of treknology that makes it
necessary for giant robots or stormtroopers with axes that look cool to
exist.

    so, do you think ovlesser would enjoy playing Doom? ;-)  he'd probably
think it was pretty tame!

--
  Wayne H. Yin
  why@mail.utexas.edu